like a bridge over troubled water (I will ease your mind)
by MiraMeraki
Summary: "Were you a father, before?" In which Lord Byron leads the Doctor down from the summit, and the Doctor breaks her third rule. (Spoilers for The Haunting of Villa Diodati)


_And the spell is broken, my lord._

Lord Byron considered the retreating figure of Miss Claremont with but a twinge of remorse. She had travelled hundreds of miles to see him, and yet her blind admiration for him seemed to diminish any allure she might have had. The girl was a fair creature, airy and delicate like a budding flower, but flowers such as her grew in abundance wherever he went. Better to appreciate a flower from afar than pluck it from its garden and watch it die.

With a sigh, he turned in the opposite direction and walked toward the lake, its smooth surface revealing no trace of last night's tempest. The events of last night still felt distant and unreal, so much so that perhaps the greatest shock of all had arrived when Mrs. Doctor came bounding down the stairs that morning, like a dream standing defiantly in the light of day. Byron had spent the day turning the dreamlike events over and over in his mind, and yet he still had no idea what to make of the whole ordeal. Any explanation he could muster sounded more preposterous than the last, and any attempt to divine information from Mrs. Doctor was met with cagey resistance, according to her strange band of cohorts.

But perhaps Fate would have him try his luck regardless, Byron thought as he approached the edge of the lake and saw the Doctor standing a few paces away. She was alone, except for the baby she cradled to her chest, and the look in her eyes as she gazed over the lake suggested that she saw more than just her reflection in the waters.

A smile tugged at Byron's lips. He had seen through her lie about the colonies from the beginning, but he invited her in regardless, for he could sense something mystical behind those wide, captivating hazel eyes. As she wandered through his estate waving her strange glowing device, he willed those eyes to turn to him, even briefly, so that he could probe their depths. Other poets would liken them to pale stars or paltry gemstones, but to him, they resembled a deep, dark well, promising life to all and death to those who delved too far.

And death _fascinated _Byron.

"Have the Shelleys eloped once again and left you with poor William?" Byron laughed as he approached her.

She lifted her head, golden hair falling perfectly around her pale face, and gave him a weary, half-smile in return. "Seeing as it's my fault they're short of a nanny, figured it's the least I could do," she said in her relaxed, Northern accent that amused and delighted him.

"You give yourself too little credit, Doctor," Byron replied, folding his hands behind his back as he stood beside her. "You were our savior in our darkest hour. Without you, Lord knows what hellish fate would have befallen us."

Her eyes fell to the baby, its sleeping face showing no trace of last night's trauma. "Hellish fates have a funny way of following me wherever I go," she murmured.

"Evil lurks in every corner of this world," Byron countered. "You are not its harbinger because you have seen more of it." He paused a moment, weighing the words on his lips. "And I can tell that you have seen so much of it, Doctor. It is written in your eyes; they seem to hold a dozen lifetimes within."

The Doctor gave him a wry smile. "Well, you're not wrong. I'm much older than you'd think."

As she spoke, she unconsciously pulled William closer to her chest, her arms forming a natural cradle as if they had done so a thousand times before.

"You're a mother," Lord Byron observed. It was not a question.

"Yes," the Doctor admitted after a while, with a quiet vulnerability that felt unsuited to the woman who commanded ungodly terrors from unknown hellscapes. "I was."

Tentatively, he took a step towards her, close enough to see her shoulders ever so slightly tremble. "I am sorry," he whispered, not knowing what else to say. It was one of the few times in his life when words escaped him.

"He reminds me of my third son," said the Doctor thoughtfully, still gazing down at William, her voice so faint that perhaps she did not realize she was speaking aloud. "Thinner face, but the nose was exactly the same. Broke it in a fight during his fourth year of the Academy. Never good in a fight, that one. When the war came, he told me…" Her breath hitched painfully, as though her lungs were trying to recall the words from the air. Pull her son, now made of only words and memories, to her chest.

For a moment, she looked so unsteady that Byron feared she might collapse. He half-expected her to pull away when he placed a hand on her shoulder, but she leaned into his touch gratefully. "You spoke of loss when you recognized that creature. Your children, were they…?"

The Doctor shook her head. "Not to the Cybermen. But there was another warrior race like them. An unbeatable race. We were locked in an endless war against them, and we lost. Everybody lost. It wiped out my home and everyone in it."

"And yet you stand," said Byron, awestruck. "A wanderer of the earth."

"Not by choice." Her feeble laugh was shaky and sad and tore at Byron's heart. "If I could trade my life for theirs, I would do it in a second."

Byron stepped back to look at her properly, this impossible woman wore strands of sunlight in her hair and could draw liquid moonlight into her veins, and the mere thought of her disappearance devastated him. "If you did, the whole world would shrivel and perish," he said with earnest desperation that surprised even him. "I have met many women in my short life, Doctor, and though you dismiss my advances, I will not waver in my conviction that you are the most precious woman to have walked this earth. So much of what you say and do flies beyond my comprehension, yet I do know that you have survived such tragedy because the universe loved you too dearly to let you go." He reached out to gently cup her face, to draw her eyes upward to his so she could see the worry they held. "Pray, do not give into despair," he told her. "This world _needs _you."

The Doctor sighed and closed her eyes. "I don't know what I'm going to do next," she admitted, fighting to keep her voice steady. "I try to save everyone, but the universe rarely works out like that. Shelley lived, but I'm scared of how many people I've killed in the future, how many will suffer, how many will be turned into…"

A silent tear trickled into Byron's hand, still cupped around her cheek, and he carefully brushed it away. He angled his torso so as to avoid crushing William, and then, before his brain could fully catch up with his body, he pulled her into an embrace.

The Doctor couldn't remember the last time she had cried. Maybe it was her first time in this body. Crying embarrassed her, but now that the floodgates had opened, she gratefully hid her face in Byron's chest. Though her whole body shook, she was determined not to make a sound, so that the child in her arms could carry on sleeping. Somehow, that made it easier to pretend he was hers.

_I miss my children. _It had been years, centuries maybe, since she allowed herself to properly think of them. _I miss my children, I miss my children, I miss my children…._

After a minute or so, her breathing evened out, and her damp eyes fluttered closed with a sigh. For so long, she had tried to tell herself that this body didn't _need_ physical reassurance, _disliked_ it, even. But gods, she had nearly forgotten how nice it was to be _held_. It was childish, simply laughable of her to feel protected by a 27-year-old human who cowered behind others in times of danger, but she wanted to indulge herself anyway. The warmth of a human body just a few degrees warmer than her own, his chin sheltering the top of her head, his fingers combing through her hair, all of it made her feel small and safe and free from the weight of a planet on her shoulders.

When she pulled away at last, he wordlessly handed her a handkerchief and spent the next minute pretending to be enraptured by sunlight bouncing off little ripples in the lake.

"You look exhausted," he said after she dried her tears, leaving only dark circles beneath her puffy eyes.

The Doctor shrugged nonchalantly. "Stayed up with William, made sure he got to sleep alright. Didn't want him to wake anyone."

Byron could imagine her sitting alone in the dark nursery, cherishing every second of the familiar weight of a child in her arms, letting the tears come only after his eyes had drifted close. _Lonely angel_, came the inexplicable thought, as though from someone else entirely. _So very, very alone. _

A high-pitched gurgle shook him from his reverie. "Shh, it's alright," said the Doctor as she bounced the wailing baby up and down. Then, to Byron's amazement, unearthly sounds began to flow from her lips, weaving into an impossibly old melody that sent chills down his spine. It sounded like wind chimes and thunder and starlight and hope. The baby fell silent, transfixed. To Byron, it felt like time itself stood still to listen.

The Doctor smiled adoringly at William, the kind of smile that warmed her cheeks and lit up her eyes. "Ancient Gallifreyan lullaby," she declared proudly. "Works every time."

"Beautiful," whispered Byron, addressing both the Doctor and her song. "What does it mean?"

Her brow furrowed. "Not sure I remember anymore. And if I don't, then nobody knows."

Byron glanced over her shoulder and saw his guests, led by the Shelleys, making their way towards them from the opposite end of the lake. "Not even your companions? I presumed you were family."

"Yeah, we are. Well, no, not really. I like to call them that, but they're all human. They don't come from my home."

"Yet they treat you like family," Byron reminded her. "Mr. O'Brien is constantly asking if you've stopped to eat something, and I swear, Miss Khan's eyes shoot daggers into me whenever I address you. They also worry for you," he added, quieter. "I have seen the way they look at you; it is as if they do not know who you are. They know you carry a great burden, yet they feel powerless to help."

"It's 'cause they can't," she tells him bitterly. "No one can. What's done is done. Nothing left to do now except move forward. It's not like they would understand, anyway."

"Indeed," Byron began, "I doubt there is a single soul on Earth who could understand you. You are fathomless, Doctor, and we are like blossoms that shrivel and die in an instant. And yet, you saved us anyway. What value you see in us I know not, but I do not presume that you would roam the heavens and the earth with insects. Our minds are limited, yes, but surely not infantile. You mourn your children, but your companions are not surrogates to be protected as penance for a time when you could not. It would be cruel to keep flowers in eternal darkness, even if the harsh sun burns them in the end."

"Time to let them grow up," she murmured thoughtfully. "Yes, I suppose you might be right." Like the clouds parting for the sun, a smile crept onto her face. "Such beautiful brains, you poets. Most brilliant brains in the world."

Then she laughed, and the sound was so sweet that he wanted to preserve it forever, so he took her in his arms and kissed her, so that he might bottle up a piece of that sound in his lungs. It was a gentle kiss, so unlike his showboating personality, and as the Doctor kissed him back, she felt the warmth of his lips and the sun on her face and his hands around her waist, and half-wondered if she would simply melt into his arms….

"Oi! Called it, didn't I, granddad?"

Lord Byron and the Doctor sprang apart as their audience was made known. Graham smiled apologetically at the pair before he turned to Ryan and handed him thirty quid, all the while grumbling about how they had _almost_ made it out. Meanwhile, Yaz's head swiveled from the Doctor to Ryan and Graham and back again, not knowing who deserved to be on the receiving end of her abject shock.

Byron did a much better job at masking his embarrassment than the Doctor; he gave her a slight, gentlemanly bow before strolling over to Polidori, all while determinedly avoiding Miss Claremont's gaze. The Doctor couldn't help but blush as she handed off William to his mother, then went to rejoin the fam.

"So much for those rules then, eh, Doc?" said Graham, while Ryan could hardly contain his laughter.

She wanted to respond with a witty defense, but she wound up giving Graham a hug instead.

Yaz and Ryan shared a stunned look. "Hey," said Yaz worriedly, "is everything alright-?"

"No," she replied, pulling away to face the three of them, "but we'll make it alright, won't we? The four of us, together?"

Team TARDIS smiled, and Yaz stepped forward to confidently take the Doctor's hand.

"Together," she said.


End file.
